5 men from Englewood held in burglary spree

A group of suspected serial burglars were caught trying to chisel open a stolen safe in an Englewood garage late Thursday, authorities said, the latest in a string of arrests in the past several weeks of more than 20 people police believe are responsible for a wave of violent crime that has plagued the city and surrounding towns.

The five suspects, all from Englewood, were tracked by a Morris County-led task force to a residential garage on William Street and surrounded by police. Two of them – Jamelle Singletary, 24, and the garage owner, Robert Hastu, 44 – were caught after police say they tried to flee in a van and then on foot. The others – Akeem Boone, Jerrell Bordeaux and Marc Rainey – were surprised while trying to crack the safe, which they had allegedly stolen from a house in Greenwich, Conn.

They were charged with receiving stolen property and possession of burglary tools, and Singletary was also charged with resisting arrest. Bail was set at $750,000 for each of them except Hastu, who is being held on $10,000 bail.

The sting was part of a monthslong multi-agency task force throughout New Jersey and along the Eastern Seaboard, according to the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office.

County Prosecutor Robert Bianchi said in a statement that combating the rise in residential burglaries was his office’s “single most pressing priority and we are coordinating our efforts with the local police departments in a way never done before.”

Englewood Police Chief Arthur O’Keefe described the suspects as reminiscent of the James Bond Gang, a crew that specialized in burglaries of high-end residences by forced entry in Bergen and Passaic counties in the 1990s. Singletary is the nephew of Leon Roberts, a known James Bond member, police said.

"These are definitely bad guys we were looking for," O'Keefe said. "These are career criminals, and we're happy to get them off the street."

He said Boone, 27, who has eight prior felony conviction, was wanted on gun and narcotic distribution charges. He and Rainey, 25, were out on bail on burglary charges in Sparta and Wyckoff, and Rainey is suspected of having been the driver in a drive-by shooting in Englewood last summer. Bordeaux, 27, was acquitted of murder in 2005, O’Keefe said.

Police said Boone, a fugitive, was being watched by the task force when he and the other suspects drove to Connecticut. Undercover detectives followed the van back to Englewood after Greenwich police put out an alert about a burglary at an expensive home, arresting the suspects a few blocks from the Englewood police headquarters.

In early October, 18 people were charged with various crimes around the city, from drive-by shootings to illegal gambling to selling drugs out of a concession stand at Mackay Park. Boone was among the 18, but had remained on the loose until his arrest Thursday. Stephanie Cotto, 19, of Teaneck is still being sought.

Half of those suspects live in Englewood; the rest reside in Teaneck, Tenafly, Perth Amboy, Bergenfield and Hackensack. They range in age from 19 to 40. The arrests were the result of a three-month investigation by Englewood and Bergen County authorities following a significant spike in violent crime that O’Keefe feared had put the “Wild West in Englewood.”

The suspects were allegedly known to raid illegal high-stakes card games, have shootouts in the street, invade homes and sell drugs around children. Shameeka Drakeford, 29, was accused of selling Ecstasy out of the concession stands of Mackay Park while a city summer employee. Thomas Solari, 19, of Tenafly allegedly distributed marijuana in a school zone.

The drive-by shootings sprang from a battle over the control of Ecstasy sales in Englewood and the region, police said.